Monday, October 18, 2010

New York Islanders: TV Coverage is a Joke

We are 5 games into the NHL 2010-2011 season and there are many surprises around the NHL.

Some of them are:

1) The remarkable 4-0 start of the Toronto Maple Leafs.2) Martin Brodeur's and Robert Luongo's sudden inability to stop pucks. 3) The hot start of the NY Islanders and more specifically Josh Bailey.

These are just some of the stories around the NHL right now and one that is bugging all Islander fans is the mockery of TV coverage that MSG+ provides.

Islander fans have no problems with Howie Rose (other than him being a Rangers fan) and Butch Goring who as a former player and coach brings a very nice perspective of the games. Butch has done an phenomenal job so far providing insights that Billy Jaffe didn't or couldn't or both.

The fans are speaking of something more subtle. Is it lost on no one that the Islanders have every one of their games broadcast on a network that owned and has the initials of where their blood rivals play?

It would be like the Red Sox being broadcast on YES2 or The Phillies being on SNY2.

If the Islanders received equally as slick production values as the top channel of the bunch, MSG network this would not be as big an issue as it is.

MSG+ is a joke. The name is a joke, the production values are a joke and whoever has been the director for the Islander games so far should be fired. Why?

I turned on the Islanders home opener and watched the pre-game show. Everything looked good. Then something happened. The color hue turned and everyone looked like a smurf with blue toned skin that made Avatar's Na'vi look pale.

It was not something that lasted for a minute and went back to normal, this was something that lasted for over 25 minutes.

I called my TV provider, DirecTV already knowing that it was not their feed causing the problem. I explained to the customer service representative what i saw and told him i don't think its you, its the feed from Cablevision. He proceeded to put me on hold and checked the TV they have in the office and came back laughing saying yes, i see the same thing the color is off and everyone looks like the smurfs.

He thanked me for reporting the problem and said he would contact the source of the feed.

The rest of the game went off O.K. except for the usual MSG+ issues of lingering on the announcers for uncomfortable lengths of time after they were done speaking or going to a shot to fast before someone was ready to speak.

Then there was the game against Pittsburgh. I turned on my new 63" HDTV to watch the Islanders take on Crosby and Company and what do i see? shadows around every player and advertisement along the boards giving me the look like the contrast was turned way to high. This lasted most of the game before the bumbling buffoons running the show fixed it.

What annoyed me even more is flipping over to the mighty MSG network and seeing perfection. Not on the ice mind you but a perfect picture. Sharp, colorful, full Dolby Digital surround 5.1 sound.

Then there was the game versus Colorado. Not the game itself. The picture was NOT HD. Why was it not in HD? Not because DirecTV does not have the bandwidth or because someone forgot to flip the HD switch, its because on the over flow channel that MSG provides for the games that are not on MSG and MSG+ simply are not broadcast in HD.

In this day and age how can ANY major sports programming not be broadcast in High Definition?

While your thinking about that one let me ask you this - During the Islanders-Penguins game why did the audio sound like it was coming through a cup with a string on it?

If you watch Islanders games on TV and judging from the ratings bump the Islanders have enjoyed since they drafted John Tavares a lot of you are then odds are you have seen mistake after mistake MSG+ has made in its Islander broadcasts. Its annoying, embarrassing and there is no excuse considering what fans pay for television these days.

Cablevision is paying the Islanders a lot of money for its broadcast rights and it shows. They take it right out of the broadcasts with what has to be interns running the graphics, audio and technical aspects. It is a disgrace and indicative of a company that is now depriving its customers of watching the FOX network of channels.

Sure FOX is greedy that much is a given but so is Cablevision any customer of theirs who has to endure their second and third rate equipment and customer service will tell you.

They would not dare put the kind of production value on their precious Knicks and Rangers. No. Mr. Dolan cares about those teams. Considering the level of success those teams have had however you would never know it.

If that's how he treats the teams he does love then you can imagine how he treats the "other" teams on his networks.

I have distanced myself as much as I can from the empire that is Cablevision, the owners of Madison Square Garden, The New York Knicks the New York Rangers, Newsday, Radio City Music Hall and countless other businesses. Its just a shame that no matter what we do Islander fans and Devil fans for that matter cannot get them out of our lives.

9 comments:

I did find out that the reason it's not in HD is because the overflow control room is not HD ready. They take on too much and have no room for this. They have rangers, Devils, Isles, Knicks..then they also do a number of out of state games, Ohio, Bay Area...they just took over control of broadcasting for SNY (they won't be directing it or anything but it does come out of their control room). They are out of control and need to be stopped!

Having been a Goring fan since 1980, I think I can be pretty objective. I thought that Billy Jaffe was one the best analysts I've heard with interesting critique when necessary-very objective. My favorite team among all of the sports is the Islander team and it's obvious Butch isn't as analytical and is somewhat of a homer. Let's be honest, Jaffe was fired because he called it liked he saw it. How refreshing.

Jaffe may have been fired for his on air performance but I never personally had a problem with anything he ever said. If the Islanders have an extended period where they play poorly you will find out what kind of an anaylist he is. Its typical for a team to have a color guy who has a huge pedigree with the team he is calling, which Jaffe didnt have and I think this is the reason they hired Goring.

I want to start a petition, you with me? Here's my biggest deal... I have Cablevision, when the islanders and devils and rangers all play on the same night, the devils get msg+ and the islanders get some shitty channel called ios some cablevision IO channel thats not in HD, I LIVE ON LONG ISLAND, WTF AM I PAYING FOR....

A petition is a good idea for raising interest but I doubt it will actually get cabevision to put their overflow games in HD. They do not even BROADCAST the overflow game in HD. DirecTV who has just about everything in HD didnt even have the overflow game in HD because their signal from the source was not HD.

Isles game against Canadians is not available in HD tonight. But If you really want to see hockey in HD you can put on MSG varsity. Lindenhurst/bayshore field hockey is on in HD right now. What a joke.

I am watching tonight 10/30/10Islanders @ Philly and game is not in HD for at least the third time this week. I am fed up with this bull. Cablevision advertises every NY sports team in HD but they are full of crap. In fact back in march they told me all the channels would be HD so for examble rather then going to 704 to watch NBC in HD now you can go to regular 4 again. This was supposed to free up the 700s for more HD programming. Why are the islanders not in HD yet?

Start a petition and send it to the attorney generals office of New York state because as we all know Newsday and News 12 are controlled by Cablevision!